48 Weeks with Donna Downey - Week 19

And now I'm up to date as I just finished this one on Friday. Here's Donna's:

To be honest, it really didn't speak to me - so much black. But I did it and although I'm not thrilled with the results, it was an interesting process. Here's my result:

Looking at it, I see several things I would like to do differently and maybe I will down the road.

48 Weeks with Donna Downey - Week 18

This week was very fun and loose. Here's Donna's:

Lot's of bright colors and doodling in the background. Here's my take on it.

Again, there are several layers here of patterned papers, stamping and doodling. You don't see it all but it really adds to the piece.

48 Weeks with Donna Downey - Week 17

This lesson was all about layers. Here's Donna's:

There are so many layers of stickers, paper, paint, stamping, etc. At first glance you only see the surface, but if you look closely you can see the layers underneath peeking out.

To give you an idea, here's my spread about half way through:

Looks very dark and grungy but I loved it and really didn't want to cover it all up. But the point of these lessons is to push ourselves out of our comfort zones and trust in the process. I'm glad I did as I love the finished spread - in fact it may be my favorite so far.

48 Weeks with Donna Downey - Week 16

I really wasn't too excited with this lesson as faces are still really hard for me. Donna used one of her own face rubber stamps and used some Krink markers for the wild hair. She also used some spray inks for the background. 

I didn't have a lot of these items so I had to improvise. I messed up my background so bad, I had to gesso over it all...TWICE. I used a stencil for the face and and my shading is getting better. It's almost too pretty, though, and I need to practice without the crutch of a stencil. Still, I'm please with the result.

48 Weeks with Donna Downey - Week 15

This week's lesson was working with watercolors. Here's Donna's - she drew a figure, then scanned and printed it and pasted it down with gel medium. She put absorbent ground over the whole spread so the watercolors would flow.

Here's my version. I drew my own woman but I'm still having problems with faces so it looks a little funky. Had a hard time with the watercolors and definitely need more practice with them.

48 Weeks with Donna Downey - Week 14

Sort of a vintage, grungy look with an interesting layout. Here's Donna's:

This one went really fast for me. I did the whole thing over the course of 2 days (usually it takes me about a week to do one of these spreads). I added some corrugated cardboard and some puzzle pieces which gave it really nice textures.

48 Weeks with Donna Downey - Week 13

Had computer problems so haven't been able to post for several weeks. But I've been working away in my journal and keeping up with the class...an accomplishment in itself.

Here's Week 13 - Donna's version:

This was a really interesting lesson. Donna started out doing a scene with flowers and a building but she didn't like where it was going and gessoed over it and ended up with this. The lesson is that we shouldn't get too attached to a particular layer or theme and if it isn't working, it's OK to start over.

So this is what I ended up with. I used some different colors and I really like the result.